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between Scotland and Sweden during the XVIIth century,
that is the century in which most of the above-named
trading Scots appear in the annals of Swedish ports.
In the earlier centuries there hardly was any commercial
intercourse between the two countries. Nor are the
reasons far to seek. Continual wars of Sweden, either
with Denmark or the mighty Hanseatic city of Liibeck,
made the passage through the Sound a most hazardous
venture. Large cities in Sweden there were none ; duties
on all imported goods were of the heaviest; and piracy,
the curse of the Middle Ages, was rife. A royal letter
of marque was issued by the King of Sweden on the 6th of
October in 1544 against the Scots,1 apparently without
much success, for in 1548 we read that the Scotch
pirates are always ready to take what they can,2 and in
the same year a that terribly great damage is done to
Swedish trade by the Scots and English, who have taken
five or six ships from Lödöse (Göteborg) last year.”2
These complaints continue till late in the XVIIth century.3
Nor are the Scots always the aggressors and the Swedes
the sufferers. Often the case was reversed. Swedish
piracy is mentioned for instance in 1506, when the Scots
are particularly named as the victims.4 During the reign
of King John III. two Scottish merchants, William Smith
and Hans Blackatt (or Blackan?), complain of Swedish
pirates, and seek to recover 3600 Thaler for a ship taken
by a certain “Antonius,”5 and so on. No wonder that in
1 See Gustaf’s Registratur, 1544.
2 Ibid., year 1548, pp. 167, 171.
3 In 1673 Alexander Waddal sends a petition to the king for redress
of damage done to three of his ships by a Scottish pirate, though they
had been provided with proper Swedish passports. Mag. Registratur.
R. A.
4 C. G. StyfFe, Bidrag till Skand. Historia, v. 82.
5 Riks A. (Kaperier).
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